Apple Support Account on X No Longer Offers Help From a Human

[George Bailey]

It won't be too long before Apple deploys an in-house domain-specific LLM to answering customer support. And it will be really good (mostly), and when it isn't it'll transfer to a human. People will of course complain loudly, but that always happens when things change.

 

[CarAnalogy]

Apple had offered human support on Twitter since 2016. Last year, the social media platform was controversially acquired by billionaire Elon Musk, but it's unclear if that was a factor in Apple's move towards automated support on the website.

The acquisition itself? Probably not. Every bad decision he's made since then? Yes probably. People are absolutely rabid with Musk hate, but everything he's done has objectively made it worse, even extreme politicization of both sides aside.

 

[CarAnalogy]

I prefer phone over any other type of support. Most companies seem to want to steer you away from phone support.

I've had to call Apple support twice. Both times I spoke to a human without any wait, the employees were easy to understand and able to understand me, the employees seemed to have above average intelligence, and they were very helpful. It was the best customer support I've experienced in the last twenty years.

The sad thing is this is how almost all companies used to be. Apple is exceptional only in maintaining a standard of quality America used to expect and was given.

All those well trained first world employees were costing too much to afford the megayachts. Cuts had to be made somewhere.

 

[paulvee]

Indeed, there seems to be more support needed with this years devices & software released. Probably a good idea to direct people right to the source.

Can you cite some data? That seems to be anecdotal information. Most people I know - and I do personal IT for people in the Apple ecosystem - seem to be fine with their new devices.

 

[alchemistmuffin]

Last year, the social media platform was controversially acquired by billionaire Elon Musk, but it's unclear if that was a factor in Apple's move towards automated support on the website

Unfortunately from what I heard from industrial source, it was the biggest factor when it came to automated support on X. Apple really hates Elon Musk to the core internally that they want nothing to with his products in the future.

Eventually they will likely stop advertising on X altogether. They already have strong presence on other social like Facebook and YouTube to the point that they don’t really need X anymore.

 

[jbrons]

AppleSupport on Twitter was incredible. I say this both as a consumer and someone with experience standing up a dedicated enterprise-level social media customer care channel (in my case, for a major coffee company in Seattle). They were unbelievably fast, responsive, and helpful.

Alas, Twitter's choice to replatform certain accounts and mismanage itself into oblivion means it's well past time to dissociate with the company and stop enriching its owner. If you're still active, it's well past time for you and your company to delete your accounts too.

 

[anthogag]

An ❌ for Twitter according to Elon 🥳

 

[Shirasaki]

So Apple decide to pull out.
Will this be another push to X’s downfall? Not really. In fact, I don’t think X will go anywhere.

Never knew you could obtain support from X and never cared.

(It is quite challenging to type X when instinct told me to type Twitter)

 

[Eggtastic]

His Royal Muskness tweeted something yesterday that convinced me to delete the app for good. I am suffering some serious withdrawal, but I think it will be worth it.

What did he say?

 

[techfreak23]

Please stop with the "X, formerly Twitter". It's so cringe. No one calls it that and they are still called tweets. I hope that name never sticks and they go back to Twitter.

 

[timber]

So less humanity in Twitter. No one will notice.

 

[jaytv111]

X Not Gon' Give (Apple support) To Ya

 

[Phantom iCloud tabs]

I deleted my Facebook account in 2016. I was one of the first Facebook users. The past 7 years have been glorious.

Also one of the first fb users. For the past six years, I've barely logged into my account at all. It's truly breathtaking how much different (and worse!) the platform is now compared to the cool little campus-based walled garden it was before. As is typical, the changes on the backend have focused on monetizing the user rather than improving their experience.

 

[Mac Fly (film)]

Wouldn't be surprised if it was down to the recent API changes implemented by X. The new API fees are exorbitant, and I suppose if Apple can have an auto-response to a different channel, it's money they don't need to spend. 🤷‍♂️

You're misunderstand it. The API affected apps, Apple were merely offering help via their account. Apple is just streamlining support to keep it exclusive to their discussion boards, phone and through their support app.

 

[jennyp]

I've had to call Apple support twice. Both times I spoke to a human without any wait

Well compared to my recent experiences you were lucky. I had what seemed an eternity of voice recognition, complete with those fake keyboard clicking sounds, until after ages I finally spoke to someone who was no doubt doing his best but whom I just couldn't understand. It was so stressful, considering I was chasing up a recent payment of thousands of pounds.

 

[Chuckeee]

Twitter, occasionally referred to as x, is slowly switching to be a fee based service. Apple, still called Apple, isn’t about to let anyone collect any fee ( without getting their own cut) for just providing access to a service Apple is providing without charge.

 

[No5tromo]

"Help"... I once reported a bug on Twitter with a very clear screen recording of the issue and a thorough description and I received an out-of-the-box response with generic troubleshooting steps

 

[Surf Monkey]

Apple’s making the right move. TwitterX is now a haven for racists, white nationalists and other extremists. As I pointed out on another thread, Apple’s presence on TwitterX legitimizes TwitterX but degrades Apple’s brand. Distancing themselves from it is smart on Apple’s part.

 

[CapitalIdea]

I highly recommend everyone listen to Linda Yaccarino’s absolutely disastrous interview at the CODE Conference the other day. The company is a wreck and she was clearly way out of her depth.

 

[MentalFabric]

Great, now stop advertising on there. It's like sponsoring a klan rally.

 

[lkrupp]

Get a clue all of you. This isn’t about Twitter/X. This is about ALL social media platforms. The Apple Discussions Forums are supported mainly by volunteers but there have always been Apple “Community Specialists” who answer some questions that the volunteers don’t. Those are also going away and only volunteers will be left.

Yeah, you all hate Elon but stop thinking this is only about Twitter/X.

 

[mac-imperator]

Can't blame them. Twitter has gone down the hill. I use the twitter search function for a particular popular topic and now the results are very limited, can't scroll down to read older tweets like before

🙂 Hilarious remark. I stopped twitter, when it was still called twitter, because it was brain numbingly boring. through out the years I thought nothing of it. After all the drama that came to light since 2016, It was no surprise to me. After Elon acquired twitter, I thought I'd give it a go again and I was pleasantly surprised. TONs of tweets that I probably wouldn't have seen before was amazing. It was quite refreshing. I enjoy now as a form of entertainment. I never did and never will rely on for for true information. I obtain that the old fashion way.

 

[Skyscraperfan]

No humans still leaves the door open to let monkeys handle the support requests.

 

[jbrons]

You're misunderstand it. The API affected apps, Apple were merely offering help via their account. Apple is just streamlining support to keep it exclusive to their discussion boards, phone and through their support app.

No, they are correct. Most large companies use third party tools to ingest, label, and prioritize all the incoming conversations via Twitter, in order to make the thousands and thousands of tweets manageable by customer service teams. Those platforms' API limitations include the number of tweets they can read each month too; there was a massive price increase, and they've had to pass along the (ridiculous) cost increases to their customers.

 

[Gasu E.]

Aw, 💩.